Desert Notes March 20, 2025

VUU has been building our budget based on the pledges and other income we have received and continue to receive from each of you. At the beginning of March we celebrated Mary Erickson as someone who has consistently supported VUU financially and as a volunteer in a number of different ways. “Wise elder” is not a term we use at VUU often–not because we lack wise people, but because so few want to be named an “elder.” However, I think we need to cultivate this role more. Someone who has given so much over many years and continues to learn, grow and lead is an asset we should celebrate! 

We also have many new folks showing up and contributing to VUU who are sharing new perspectives, resources and ideas for how we can grow as a community–also bringing new questions and a desire to feel a sense of belonging and connection. Last weekend we were blessed by an opportunity to learn together and remember together the legacy of Cesar Chavez and other leaders in the United Farm Workers Union. This program was the result of planning and conversations with members Beatriz Arias Cisneros and Sheila Lopez, who joined within the last two years. At a time when our current administration is destroying our connections to important and diverse leaders by taking down web pages or editing out their contributions, it feels important to be honoring these legacies. Simultaneously, it feels important that we look for ways to show up in our community and speak up against the destruction of our democracy.  

There are so many ways to do this, but I want to encourage us to be thinking more about how we can be doing this together. Are you going to a protest? Reach out to let us know so some of us can join you. Make signs that reference our VUU community support! Wear UU shirts! Going to a meeting? Volunteering somewhere? Writing letters to legislators? Invite members of the VUU community; create a team to do these things with you! I was listening to AZ Attorney General Kris Mayes at a Civic Engagement Beyond Voting Meeting (CEBV) this week (more than 400 people on a zoom call, a number of them VUUers!) She emphasized that two strategies right now are “courts and crowds.” We can’t all be the AG and fighting the court battles, but we can show up and create crowds to draw attention to what is happening. We can make phone calls, write letters, and plan actions. And we can take care of the needs that arise, whether it’s helping pay for the legal costs of an immigrant family we are accompanying, providing safe space for groups to meet and discuss actions and needs, or participating in mutual aid structures. And friends, I can’t organize all of these pieces by myself or even initiate all of these. Some of you are going to have to organize meetings, post information, and invite others to join you. (And some of you are doing this! Thanks!)  I can help you get the word out to other VUU folks, we can offer meeting space resources and share ideas. Sometimes having “300 roommates” is a great way to start a movement.  

Note: Photo is from last week’s service, “Remembering the Legacy of Cesar Chavez,” with Marco Albarrān, Zarco Guerroero, Carmen de Novais. Brought to you by Beatriz Arias Cisneros and Sheila Lopez. Piano Accompaniment by Felix Werwer.

—Rev. Sarah Oglesby-Dunegan